It's a beautiful October day, but our hike is starting behind schedule. We were supposed to meet at seven in Seattle, then drive out to Mount Persis in one vehicle. But then newlyweds Stacy and Darren were half an hour late, and we made an unscheduled stop in Gold Bar, taking way more time than we should to get espressos and snacks. And now my companions are blowing even more time fussing with their gear at the trailhead.

I calculate that we can still make the top and get back before dark, if we are all strong hikers. As the leader, entrusted by the hiking club with the safety of my companions, I can - and must - turn us around before the summit if necessary. Even if we have to do that, on this particular hike we'll still catch plenty of spectacular views coming down. So it's okay that we're not putting our boots to dirt until nearly ten o'clock.

The group of inexperienced but seemingly gung-ho hikers whom I'm guiding are all in their early- to mid-twenties, just a few years younger than me. We have Darren and Stacy, both blonde, fit, and a bit too good-looking, with their brand-new boots and expensive backpacks. We also have Hamid, a gangly first-generation Somali-American with bushy hair who seems to have loaded down his pack with every outdoor gadget he could find at REI. Like Darren, he looks strong enough to carry plenty of weight, so I don't nitpick his packing.

I immediately like Hamid, as well as Rachel, a stocky but tough-looking Southeast Asian woman whose backpack's hip belt sprouts a heavy-looking patch pocket, assumedly to keep a steady supply of snacks within easy reach. She has also brought her dog, a small, friendly Dalmatian-hound mix ironically named Cujo.

Today's objective is Mount Persis, the first mile-high mountain you encounter leaving town on US Highway 2. It's a strenuous but worthwhile hike, featuring spectacular views over Puget Sound and a couple of tiny alpine lakes just below the summit. The ascent is nontechnical, simply requiring plenty of boot and muscle.

< = = = = = = = = >

We make good progress, gaining the first two thousand feet by noon. Just after surmounting a couple of steep switchbacks, we stop for lunch at a lovely open grove of old-growth cedars, featuring a cliffy ledge that overlooks the Skykomish River far below.

Not long after we resume our trek, Rachel and Cujo in front, the dog suddenly freezes, forcing us all to stop. He glares into the towering Doug firs to our south, growling.

"Easy, Cujo!" commands Rachel sharply, prompting snickers from the rest of the group at the name of this friendly little mutt. She nudges him with her foot to get him moving again and we resume our march up the mountain, but Cujo still seems spooked for a while, taking more sideward glances, growling lightly several times.

"I don't know what's gotten into him," Rachel puzzles.

We eventually forget about this as we trudge upward, mostly in a sweaty Zen state, not talking much.

Conversation resumes fairly high on the mountain, however, as we pass through a band of larch trees whose needles have turned yellow for the season. We have fun discussing the fact that here in the Northwest, there is such a thing as a deciduous conifer that sheds its needles in Autumn. We also discuss the converse botanical oddity of our native broadleaf evergreen, the beautiful Madrone, although those grow down at sea level and not up here.

The conversation ceases abruptly as Cujo once again halts, growling off to the south and straining against his leash. Well-equipped Hamid breaks out his binoculars, glassing through the dark woods in the general direction Cujo is staring, also aiming a high-powered flashlight in the same direction.

"Oh shit, dudes!" as he aims his gaze higher. "There's a cougar up in that tree over there!"

Sure enough, about fifty yards away, we see the green eyes of a big kitty glowering back at us. Cujo issues a couple of ferocious barks. The cat growls at us, sending shivers down all of our spines, and deftly slinks away through the canopy.

We all feel relieved to know why Cujo has been growling. I remind my party that although mountain lions are intimidating, they are rarely a danger to adult humans. Most hikers aren't even aware when one is nearby. They just lurk there up in the trees, watching.

"Good boy, Cujo!" says Rachel as we move on, bending down to nuzzle and praise him. "Who's a good watchdog? You'se a good watchdog!"

< = = = = = = = = >

We finally reach Mount Persis's summit bowl, finding the promised alpine tarns even more beautiful than we expected. Although the temperature is in the fifties at this elevation, the sun feels warm enough that we all strip and dip, our playful squeals and screams echoing off the summit block as our bodies hit the frigid water. I'm surprised and pleased that no one feels any compunction at doing this, and I enjoy the look of every single one of them naked. Not that I should, but I would do any of them, even self-absorbed Darren. This splash of fun doesn't last long, due to the chill of the water, and we quickly dry off and get dressed again.

Unlike lower down, Darren finds a cellphone signal, casually checking his socials. Personally, I'm old-school, generally preferring that people not use their digital devices out in this near-Wilderness setting. But I'm not a dictator, and I always let the group decide whether to have any rules about digital disconnection.

"Oh, hey," Darren says nonchalantly, reading something. "Did you guys see this story about the escaped prisoner?"

"Escaped from where?" I ask, a bit too sharply, knowing the state prison is nearby.

"Monroe. Where's that?"

"Dude, pay attention!" chides Hamid. "We went through Monroe on the way here! It's only ten miles away."

"I'm sorry, folks," I admit sheepishly. My face flushes with embarrassment, recognizing that it's my responsibility to keep our group safe. "I was too busy the last couple of days to stay up on the news."

"Are you just trying to scare us?" Stacy challenges her new husband skeptically. I gather he's pulled stunts like this before. "Because that's not fucking funny. What if he comes after us up here?"

"This isn't some horror movie," he scoffs. "He's not going to climb a mountain and attack us. This post says he robbed someone on the side of the road, stole his money and clothes, and then bought burner phones and power packs at a convenience store." Still dismissive, he says, "I'm sure he called a buddy to pick him up, and he's two states away by now." Then his face darkens at least slightly. "It does say his sentence was for murder."

"What?!" Rachel and Stacy shriek simultaneously.

"Holy shit," says Hamid, wide-eyed, summing up my feelings too.

Escaped con or no escaped con, I suddenly realize we have a more immediate concern. We have wasted too much time hanging out here on top of the mountain. We are going to have to move our asses to reach the car by dusk.

We pick up the pace on the descent, soon covering enough ground to alleviate my worries about our return time.

As we pick our way down a rocky stretch of trail, Darren stumbles. He falls hard, clobbering a rock with his knee. Or, more accurately, clobbering his knee with a rock.

"Fuuuck!!" he screams.

"Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!" yells Stacy, who's right behind him, as she awkwardly hops over a vine that's stretched tightly across the trail, which apparently caused Darren's fall. "Oh baby, are you okay?"

"No!" he exclaims, clutching his knee and writhing. "I think I cracked my kneecap."

Trained in First Aid, I quickly give Darren an amateur exam and confirm his suspicion. I get out a wrap bandage and do my best to stabilize his patella, also feeding him some pain pills. He can stand up and walk, but slowly.

I am no longer confident that we can get back by dark.

Darren puts on a brave face. "You guys go ahead. Stace and I can build a fire, and we've got enough warm clothing to make it through the night."

"No, as hike leader, I have to insist that we stick together. If that means we all spend the night up here, we're equipped for that. And I make a pretty mean campfire. We're all safer that way."

"We especially should not split up given an escaped whackjob on the loose," echoes Rachel.

"Fuckin' A right," agrees Hamid. "You said this isn't a horror movie," he observes wryly, "but suddenly it feels a little like one." More concerningly, he adds, "And I think I would have remembered that vine being there on the way up."

This realization spreads Hamid's concern to the entire group, removing any doubts about sticking together. At least this avoids the usual first mistake of horror-movie victims.

< = = = = = = = = >

Realizing we're not far above that cedar grove where we had lunch, we work our way down there, taking another hour for what would normally be ten minutes of hiking. We enjoy a dinner of extra trail snacks, a fiery sunset from the overlook at the edge of the grove, and reasonably enjoyable conversation (given the circumstances) on two logs next to a roaring fire. Hamid, Rachel and I are squeezed tightly enough on our log that our thighs just touch. Not that I'd expect anything to happen, but I don't mind the idea of spending the night stuck on a mountain with them.

After it's gotten dark, Darren apparently tries to spook the rest of us, spinning up some modern ghost story about a spirit that changes the settings on a guy's phone, allowing for some sort of mobile haunting. We don't fully follow the story, nor do we want to, so we shut that shit down before he gets very far.

Rebuffed from having that kind of fun, Darren starts getting amorous with Stacy instead. Newlyweds.

"Those two are so insecure, trying to make us single folks jealous," Rachel scoffs quietly. I hadn't quite seen them that way, but I see why she might.

"We heard that!" bellows Stacy.

"You three are welcome to fire up your own threesome over there if you want," taunts Darren, laughing obnoxiously and making Stacy giggle.

"You wish!" Rachel barks back. She has placed a hand on each of our thighs, though. I wish, anyway.

While Rachel focused on that retort, Hamid and I exchanged a hopeful, hungry glance.

A cooling breeze blows through our campsite, leading Rachel to wrap her arms around each of our backs and huddle us closer. While Hamid and I return the favor, putting our arms around Rachel's shoulders, his hand also runs up my arm.

Hamid kisses the back of her neck, then looks at me again. Before I even know what's happening, his lips are on mine, which prompts Rachel to massage our legs sensually.

"Oh, eew!" utters Darren, more to Stacy, but we hear it.

"It was your idea, Darren!" taunts Rachel, her mouth joining ours in a three-way kiss, her hands now rubbing our crotch bulges.

Stacy mutters something that's inaudible to us, though it's unclear whether she's more annoyed by our activity or the fact that Darren provoked us into it. She excuses herself to pee, throwing the three of us a somewhat ambiguous smirk. She walks towards the overlook, apparently choosing the loo with a view.

Psss! Although she's out of our view, she's not out of hearing range.

"Stace, we can hear you!" shouts Darren. She could have picked a spot further away to take her leak.

Suddenly, Cujo starts growling in a direction just uphill of Stacy.

I hear a couple of thumps, a clunk, a cry from Stacy, and a couple of louder THUMPs.

"Holy shit!" screams Darren. "She fell!" He hobbles down the trail, around the downhill switchback towards where Stacy would land, going thump-THUMP ... thump-THUMP ... thump-THUMP.

"Darren, I don't think you should ..." I call after him.

Thump-THUMP.

TWANG-ang-ang-ang.

WHUMP.

"... leave the group," I quietly finish the thought.

"The fuck was that?!" yells Hamid. We grab our flashlights and head down the trail.

As we approach Darren's fallen form, Rachel lets out a blood-curdling scream.

Seeing a glint in my flashlight beam, I shout, "STOP!!" and halt so fast that Hamid and Rachel pile into me. "Look," I stammer, shining my beam left and right at what would have been about Darren's neck level.

A length of thin wire stretches between two trees on opposite sides of the trail. Dripping with blood.

Darren's head is half-detached from his fallen body, a gurgling sound emanating from his neck as blood pours out, his eyes already clouded by death.

We pull each other into a tight hug, suddenly feeling real terror. This was no accident. Cujo sniffs Darren's body and bellows a mournful howl.

Still unsure of Stacy's outcome, we continue down the trail, shining our lights and keeping our eyes peeled in all directions. Her lifeless body lies facedown at the bottom of the drop.

We find a bloody rock nearby. And an impact wound to the back of her head.

She didn't fall, we all realize. She was clubbed.

Some mountain guide you are, I chastise myself. Two of your charges just got fucking murdered. Try to keep the other two alive, dipshit.

< = = = = = = = = >

As we gingerly stalk our way back to our campfire, Rachel anxiously encourages, "Good watchdog, Cujo. Keep your eyes open, boy."

Time to phone for help. I reach into my pack, finding it wet inside. Fuck! Another failure. One of my water bottles has leaked, bricking my cellphone. We learn that Hamid is on a digital detox and didn't bring one at all. And Rachel's is down to a three percent charge. She finds a weak signal, tries 911, and hears a broken "9-1-1. What's your emergency?" just before it goes dead. Not only that, none of us has brought a power pack, something I almost always remember. You're fucking up even worse, Joe! Together, we creep back down to Darren's body to retrieve his phone from his hip pocket. But the screen was shattered in his fall.

"At least I brought my gun," says Rachel flatly.

"Gun?!" Hamid and I both ask. Oh, so that's what's in that side pocket of hers. I hadn't noticed until now that she wasn't getting her snacks from there. I'm not opposed to my hikers packing weapons, but it is unusual, and I hadn't profiled Rachel as the type to carry.

A bit uncertainly, she ventures, "Wait ... it's supposed to be the Final Girl that takes out the killer in the end, isn't it?"

"I sure as hell hope so," acknowledges Hamid.

"Do you know how to use it?" I ask tentatively.

"My dad's a cop, and took me to the shooting range a few times. Although I haven't really practiced with this one."

"Good enough."

After a few minutes of quiet, we hear ...

Thump. Thump. Thump.

Cujo growls. Rachel stiffens and zips open her pistol pouch, drawing the weapon.

Thump. Thump.

Cujo takes off.

"Cujo, NO!" shrieks Rachel. Running towards whoever is clomping around out there, Cujo has put himself not only in danger of being attacked directly, but of getting shot, now being between Rachel's gun and any attacker.

Thump-thump ... thump-thump ... thump ... thump ... thump.

The beam of Hamid's flashlight illuminates the bouncing white tail of a deer fleeing in long leaps.

"Whew!" we all sigh simultaneously, expressing far more relief than is justified. We continue murmuring lightly, trying to keep each other's spirits up, for quite a few minutes. We talk about anything but our current situation: music, the news, TV shows, our families, anything. Obviously, our threesome has been postponed. Okay, canceled. Survival takes priority.

Brrrinnng!

A phone starts ringing.

"What phone is that!?" puzzles Hamid. "I thought they were all dead."

"They are," states Rachel solemnly.

On the second ring, I can tell that it's coming from somewhere uphill from us, maybe a couple of dozen yards away.

"What. The. Fuck." says Hamid. "We heard the guy bought a bunch of burner phones, didn't we?"

The phone stops after five rings, the woods unnaturally silent now.

Even if we were able to continue making conversation, which we are no longer fit to do, it would be a bad idea. We need to keep our ears open to the slightest sound.

We huddle together silently for at least an hour, eventually drifting off.

< = = = = = = = = >

Ding! Rrring! Dong! Ding! Dong!

The jangling, jarring sound of multitudinous clanging clocks from Pink Floyd's "Time" explodes through our quiet cedar cathedral, coming from at least two different directions, closer than the first ringing phone had been. The intro to that song can be startling enough under normal circumstances, if you have the volume turned up and aren't expecting it. Hearing it from a phone ten yards away, at midnight, in the mountains, having fallen asleep knowing we are being stalked by a homicidal maniac, almost gives us all heart attacks.

"Goddamnit!" cries Hamid with trembling anger. "Leave us alone, you piece of shit!"

"Fucker's using ringtones on those burner phones to pull psyops on us," comments Rachel nervously. "Just for that," she mutters, "when we do finally have our showdown with him, I'm going to shoot him in the leg first. And work my way upward six inches per bullet."

Keeping our voices down, we review our situation, noting that our adversary is unlikely to have obtained a firearm. It's also unlikely he would expect us to be armed, possibly making him overconfident. We agree to take turns staying awake. I agree to the first shift, taking in Rachel's quiet instructions on how to use her Glock.

Hamid and Rachel snuggle closely by the fire. It looks like there might be something going on under the lightweight blanket that Hamid brought, but given our near-death situation, I can't blame them. I'll get my turn with her next. If we live.

After an hour, feeling sleepy and seeing Hamid's eyes pop open, we change guard. I hand him the gun, relieved to take a break, close my eyes and best of all, spoon Rachel. She gently pushes her round butt back against my surprisingly erect cock, pulling my hand under her fleece jacket. I catch a grin from Hamid, who may have been doing the same thing. It's remarkably comforting to gently cup Rachel's soft boobs for a few minutes before drifting off.

< = = = = = = = = >

Thump! Thump! Thump! THUMP! THUMP! Woof! WOOF! Snarl!

I become aware of footsteps. Running footsteps, quickly approaching. Little Cujo goes off like a mousetrap, barking furiously. In the firelight, I see a large bearded man rapidly charging down the trail towards us. And by us, I mean Rachel and me.

He has a big knife in his hand.

Lying on the ground, Rachel and I are unable to get up in time.

BOOM!

The man's body is knocked slightly off course, spinning, flailing and landing on his back right beside us. Hamid has shot him, but can't take a second shot because Rachel and I are now in his line of fire.

The guy starts to roll towards us, blade still in hand.

I scramble backwards, pulling Rachel back with me just in time to miss his slashing motion.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Two shots to the chest roll our attacker onto his back again, and another shot to the head finishes him off.

BOOM! BOOM!

"You can stop shooting now, Hamid!" bellows Rachel, our legs now splattered with blood and brains. "He's fucking dead."

After a long moment of us catching our breaths, frozen in place while exchanging wide-eyed looks, Hamid carefully sets down the weapon and wryly observes, "Happiness is a warm gun."

We gather into a big, long hug. Rachel plants kisses on each of our tear-stained cheeks, exhaling, "You saved my life! Both of you." She grabs Hamid's head and kisses him on the mouth, then grabs my head and does the same to me.

Unable to ignore the (dead) elephant in the room for long, we drag our attacker's incredibly heavy body to the ledge and roll him off.

"I'm just glad to be alive right now," I say.

"We are bonded forever by this experience," declares Rachel, taking a deep breath and holding both of our hands.

"Good reminder to live each day to the fullest," Hamid muses. "Maybe I don't always do that."

"Yes, let's," Rachel purrs, pulling us closer. "We can start by having that threesome. I need a good fucking right now, and so do both of you."